上师的必要性
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中文
第四章
导师的必要性
每一个灵魂注定要达到完美，每一个存在，在最终，都将达到完美的境界。我们现在的一切，是我们过去的行为与思想的结果；而我们将来的一切，将是我们现在所思所为的结果。然而，这种塑造我们自身命运的过程，并不排除我们从外部获得帮助；不，在绝大多数情况下，这种帮助是绝对必要的。当它降临时，灵魂中更高的力量与可能性被唤醒，灵性生命得到激活，成长被推动，人终于变得神圣而完美。
这种激活的冲力，无法从书本中获取。灵魂只能从另一个灵魂接受冲力，而从其他任何事物都得不到。我们可以一生研习书本，可以变得极为博学；但在最终，我们会发现，我们在灵性上丝毫未曾成长。高度的智识发展与灵性方面的相应发展并肩而行，这并非普遍的真理。在研习书本的过程中，我们有时会被迷惑，以为由此正在获得灵性上的帮助；但若我们分析研习书本对自身的影响，便会发现，至多是我们的理智从中获益，而非我们内在的灵魂。书本在促进灵性成长方面的不足，正是这样一个原因——尽管我们几乎每个人都能在灵性问题上侃侃而谈，但当涉及行动与真正灵性生命的践行时，我们却发现自己如此令人沮丧地不足。要激活灵性，冲力必须来自另一个灵魂。
从其灵魂中发出这种冲力的人，被称为导师（Guru）；而灵魂接受此冲力的人，被称为弟子（Shishya）——学生。要向任何灵魂传递这种冲力，首先，发出冲力的灵魂必须拥有将其如实传递于他人的能力；其次，接受冲力的灵魂必须具备接受它的条件。种子必须是有生命力的种子，土地必须已经犁好；当这两个条件都具备时，真正宗教的奇妙成长便会发生。"真正的宗教传道者必须具有绝妙的能力，其聆听者亦须聪慧"——
当双方都真正地奇妙卓越之时，才会产生灿烂的灵性觉醒，否则便不会。唯有这样的人才是真正的导师，唯有这样的人也才是真正的学生、真正的探道者。其余的人只不过是在玩弄灵性。他们只是唤起了一点好奇心，只是在他们心中点燃了一点智识上的渴望，但他们仅仅站在宗教地平线的外缘。当然，这也有一定的价值，因为它可能在一定时间后导致对宗教真正渴望的觉醒；而自然界有一条神秘的法则：一旦土地已经准备好，种子必将也确实会到来；一旦灵魂真诚地渴望拥有宗教，宗教力量的传递者必将也确实会出现来帮助那个灵魂。当那吸引宗教之光的力量在接受灵魂中充盈而强大时，那回应此吸引、将光芒送入的力量，也会必然地到来。
然而，在这条道路上存在着某些巨大的危险。例如，对接受灵魂来说，有将一时的情绪错认为真正宗教渴望的危险。我们可以在自身中观察这一点。在我们生命中，许多时候，我们所爱的人离世了；我们遭受打击；我们感到世界正在从我们手指间滑走，我们需要某种更为坚实与崇高的事物，我们必须变得有宗教信仰。过了几天，那种情感的浪潮便消退了，我们再度被搁浅在与从前完全相同的地方。我们所有人常常将这样的冲动误认为是对宗教的真正渴望；但只要这种片刻的情绪被如此误认，那种灵魂对宗教持续的、真实的渴望便不会到来，我们也不会找到将灵性真正传入我们本性的传递者。因此，每当我们受到诱惑，要抱怨我们对真理的探寻——那我们如此渴望的真理——证明是徒劳之时，我们不应如此抱怨，而应将首要的义务定为：审视自己的灵魂，看看心中的渴望是否真实。如此，在绝大多数情况下，便会发现，我们尚未具备接受真理的条件，我们对灵性的渴望并非真实。
在传递者、即导师方面，还存在更大的危险。有许多人，虽沉溺于无明之中，却因内心的傲慢而自以为无所不知，不仅止步于此，更主动承担起引导他人的责任；如此，盲者引领盲者，两者皆坠入深坑之中。
English
CHAPTER IV
THE NEED OF GURU
Every soul is destined to be perfect, and every being, in the end, will attain the state of perfection. Whatever we are now is the result of our acts and thoughts in the past; and whatever we shall be in the future will be the result of what we think and do now. But this, the shaping of our own destinies, does not preclude our receiving help from outside; nay, in the vast majority of cases such help is absolutely necessary. When it comes, the higher powers and possibilities of the soul are quickened, spiritual life is awakened, growth is animated, and man becomes holy and perfect in the end.
This quickening impulse cannot be derived from books. The soul can only receive impulses from another soul, and from nothing else. We may study books all our lives, we may become very intellectual, but in the end we find that we have not developed at all spiritually. It is not true that a high order of intellectual development always goes hand in hand with a proportionate development of the spiritual side in Man. In studying books we are sometimes deluded into thinking that thereby we are being spiritually helped; but if we analyse the effect of the study of books on ourselves, we shall find that at the utmost it is only our intellect that derives profit from such studies, and not our inner spirit. This inadequacy of books to quicken spiritual growth is the reason why, although almost every one of us can speak most wonderfully on spiritual matters, when it comes to action and the living of a truly spiritual life, we find ourselves so awfully deficient. To quicken the spirit, the impulse must come from another soul.
The person from whose soul such impulse comes is called the Guru — the teacher; and the person to whose soul the impulse is conveyed is called the Shishya — the student. To convey such an impulse to any soul, in the first place, the soul from which it proceeds must possess the power of transmitting it, as it were, to another; and in the second place, the soul to which it is transmitted must be fit to receive it. The seed must be a living seed, and the field must be ready ploughed; and when both these conditions are fulfilled, a wonderful growth of genuine religion takes place. "The true preacher of religion has to be of wonderful capabilities, and clever shall his hearer be" —
and when both of these are really wonderful and extraordinary, then will a splendid spiritual awakening result, and not otherwise. Such alone are the real teachers, and such alone are also the real students, the real aspirants. All others are only playing with spirituality. They have just a little curiosity awakened, just a little intellectual aspiration kindled in them, but are merely standing on the outward fringe of the horizon of religion. There is no doubt some value even in that, as it may in course of time result in the awakening of a real thirst for religion; and it is a mysterious law of nature that as soon as the field is ready, the seed must and does come; as soon as the soul earnestly desires to have religion, the transmitter of the religious force must and does appear to help that soul. When the power that attracts the light of religion in the receiving soul is full and strong, the power which answers to that attraction and sends in light does come as a matter of course.
There are, however, certain great dangers in the way. There is, for instance, the danger to the receiving soul of its mistaking momentary emotions for real religious yearning. We may study that in ourselves. Many a time in our lives, somebody dies whom we loved; we receive a blow; we feel that the world is slipping between our fingers, that we want something surer and higher, and that we must become religious. In a few days that wave of feeling has passed away, and we are left stranded just where we were before. We are all of us often mistaking such impulses for real thirst after religion; but as long as these momentary emotions are thus mistaken, that continuous, real craving of the soul for religion will not come, and we shall not find the true transmitter of spirituality into our nature. So whenever we are tempted to complain of our search after the truth that we desire so much, proving vain, instead of so complaining, our first duty ought to be to look into our own souls and find whether the craving in the heart is real. Then in the vast majority of cases it would be discovered that we were not fit for receiving the truth, that there was no real thirst for spirituality.
There are still greater dangers in regard to the transmitter, the Guru. There are many who, though immersed in ignorance, yet, in the pride of their hearts, fancy they know everything, and not only do not stop there, but offer to take others on their shoulders; and thus the blind leading the blind, both fall into the ditch.
文本来自Wikisource公共领域。原版由阿德瓦伊塔修道院出版。